Sunday, March 2, 2008
Tuesday, February 26, 2008
The good old days.
Ahh how I miss griefing my own faction when the raids were done and the honor system yielded nothing more than a senseless grind. However, I actually enjoyed pvp back then more. You know who the top dogs on the server were. You might have hated them, or liked them, it didn't matter, because you respected them.
That's something the recent pvp system really lacks lately, is a real sense of community. Now, it just seems like you're tossed in the same random sandboxed pvp matches, but with completely new and different people. You don't really know anyone in the BG, except the people you queued up with. There's no sense of respect for the opponent anymore, because you don't really know who they are, and you don't really care. That goes a long way to take a lot of the fun out of the matches. There's no sense of pride in beating a team. Now the best you can get is "we beat a tich/blackrock/silverhand/etc premade. But, who cares? They're just random "faces" that you don't even really know.
And now it seems that the current trend is to add guards everywhere, even to all the new instances that are in CONTESTED areas. I just don't get it. What happened to fighting over content? What happened to having WARS in WARcraft on PVP servers. Come on. Blizzard has caved into people getting so butthurt over PVP happening on PVP servers, that PvP is now discouraged as much as possible, except when leveling out in the boonies. Whoopdee do.
The world pvp in this game lost its epic feel a long time ago. I'm hoping they will bring it back in WotLK. No more guards outside of instances or near meeting stones. No more flying mount guards that storm bolt you out of the sky. No more of that faggotry. If you want to put that stuff in on PVE servers, FINE. Go ahead. But let the people who rolled on pvp servers actually get the feeling that they are on one for once, ok? The actualy mechanics in wow for PvP in terms of combat are pretty solid. It would be even better, if you let the players create epic pvp encounters of their own, especially when they get tired of the same 4 battlegrounds all the time, doing the same exact routine, for the umpteenth time, against anonymous, meaningless, faceless opponents that they could care less about.
Monday, February 25, 2008
Shaman & Lock changes
2.4 looks like one hell of a patch, but it's still too early to tell if it's going to be a good patch or not.
Gear-wise, it should be fantastic. For anyone leveling new characters from here on out, gearing up should be much less tedious.
1) The shaman changes so far look OK. Unfortunately, their out of control burst had to be nerfed. As much as I hate to see classes get nerfed, I had a feeling it was coming. I don't know why Blizzard didn't change the EM + NS combo back when they nerfed combustion for mages, but waiting this long to do it will only cause unnecessary pain. Hopefully they'll get a lot of other buffs to make up for the areas that shaman are weak in. The insta ghost wolf and undispelable rage talent changes look awesome. Hopefully enhancement gets some more love, as it needs it more than any other tree. I also don't agree with nerfing the spell pushback bonus on on the ele gear set down to 50%. If you're going to take away shaman guaranteed crit burst, then at least let them keep their sustained damage. I'm glad to see that they will be getting a lot of totem love coming up this patch.
2) The warlock changes. Incinerate changes look good. Lifetap changes look bad, but I know why they're doing it. It's a direct nerf to warlock efficiency and staying power, which, under many conditions, can be a little outrageous. HOWEVER, when you consider the fact that A) Warlocks typically have 0 armor against most physical dpsers this season, and B) heavy melee teams are all the rage (heh) this season, things were already looking bad. You already don't see warlock dominance this season simply because of the changes made at the end of season 2. Warlocks simply do not have the staying power they once did, simply because how easy they are to assist train down and are forced to eat nearly every second of it that they are not bopped or Pain suppressed. Melee rape warlocks this season ridiculously hard, harder than the devs are probably realizing.
I have a feeling that with this new proposed lifetap change (that already screwes PVE locks quite a bit), that if warlocks are given no escape methods or other ways to mitigate damage from physical dps assailants, then they will essentially swap places with mages as far as class representation goes for season 4. I believe that there could have been another way to balance warlocks more effectively, but this was the wrong way to do it. Hopefully there are other, more positive changes coming down the road for locks, because as it stands, they'll be pretty weak in the long run after this change. I just find it odd that lifetap now scales negatively against getting higher level gear. Gaining stamina hurts warlock efficiency? Weird. Just doesn't make any sense. I can't see it staying this way.
It also strikes me as odd that nothing was done with warriors at all, yet they will only continue to grow even stronger with every arena season that passes, as they arguably gain the most benefit from their iLvLs than any other class. Warriors always start out weak when gear levels are reset at release of the game or expansion, and then dominate when gear levels are maxed out. I don't think that system will ever change.
Also, my forum access has been removed. Yeah, it was for leaking stuff I absolutely shouldn't have. No, I can't blame them, as I shouldn't have. Also, I no longer play on tichondrius, so don't bother harassing me or (especially) tom anymore. You stalkers with nothing better to do can go eat a dick for all I care. If you need to get ahold of me for any legitimate reason, just post here and I'll get in touch with you somehow.
Also, Sorry to hear about Maso.
Edit: To clarify, I won't be playing on Leiah or Jadefury. I'm now playing and submitting feedback for druid on another server. (Balance is pretty weak, although the other two trees are quite solid)
Gear-wise, it should be fantastic. For anyone leveling new characters from here on out, gearing up should be much less tedious.
1) The shaman changes so far look OK. Unfortunately, their out of control burst had to be nerfed. As much as I hate to see classes get nerfed, I had a feeling it was coming. I don't know why Blizzard didn't change the EM + NS combo back when they nerfed combustion for mages, but waiting this long to do it will only cause unnecessary pain. Hopefully they'll get a lot of other buffs to make up for the areas that shaman are weak in. The insta ghost wolf and undispelable rage talent changes look awesome. Hopefully enhancement gets some more love, as it needs it more than any other tree. I also don't agree with nerfing the spell pushback bonus on on the ele gear set down to 50%. If you're going to take away shaman guaranteed crit burst, then at least let them keep their sustained damage. I'm glad to see that they will be getting a lot of totem love coming up this patch.
2) The warlock changes. Incinerate changes look good. Lifetap changes look bad, but I know why they're doing it. It's a direct nerf to warlock efficiency and staying power, which, under many conditions, can be a little outrageous. HOWEVER, when you consider the fact that A) Warlocks typically have 0 armor against most physical dpsers this season, and B) heavy melee teams are all the rage (heh) this season, things were already looking bad. You already don't see warlock dominance this season simply because of the changes made at the end of season 2. Warlocks simply do not have the staying power they once did, simply because how easy they are to assist train down and are forced to eat nearly every second of it that they are not bopped or Pain suppressed. Melee rape warlocks this season ridiculously hard, harder than the devs are probably realizing.
I have a feeling that with this new proposed lifetap change (that already screwes PVE locks quite a bit), that if warlocks are given no escape methods or other ways to mitigate damage from physical dps assailants, then they will essentially swap places with mages as far as class representation goes for season 4. I believe that there could have been another way to balance warlocks more effectively, but this was the wrong way to do it. Hopefully there are other, more positive changes coming down the road for locks, because as it stands, they'll be pretty weak in the long run after this change. I just find it odd that lifetap now scales negatively against getting higher level gear. Gaining stamina hurts warlock efficiency? Weird. Just doesn't make any sense. I can't see it staying this way.
It also strikes me as odd that nothing was done with warriors at all, yet they will only continue to grow even stronger with every arena season that passes, as they arguably gain the most benefit from their iLvLs than any other class. Warriors always start out weak when gear levels are reset at release of the game or expansion, and then dominate when gear levels are maxed out. I don't think that system will ever change.
Also, my forum access has been removed. Yeah, it was for leaking stuff I absolutely shouldn't have. No, I can't blame them, as I shouldn't have. Also, I no longer play on tichondrius, so don't bother harassing me or (especially) tom anymore. You stalkers with nothing better to do can go eat a dick for all I care. If you need to get ahold of me for any legitimate reason, just post here and I'll get in touch with you somehow.
Also, Sorry to hear about Maso.
Edit: To clarify, I won't be playing on Leiah or Jadefury. I'm now playing and submitting feedback for druid on another server. (Balance is pretty weak, although the other two trees are quite solid)
Monday, January 7, 2008
Affliction, where have you gone?
Are any Non-soul link builds popular at high ratings anymore anywhere? I really can't remember the last time I've seen a UA lock anywhere. Even on burn teams, I've typically been seeing warlocks as some sort of SL/SL or Felguard variant lately.
I have a couple ideas to sort of ease the reliance on soul link for group play for affliction, but I've given up hope on the destro side.
For affliction, I'm still convinced that moving soul siphon down to deep affliction would be the best way to go, but improving it more than it currently is. It's a pretty potent talent, but I think adding soul siphon to benefit siphon life the same way it does drain life would be a fantastic start, especially on a build that also contains Contagion. You could also possibly put mana drain scaling back into this talent as well if it's that deep, and deep enough so that even level 80 builds can't have both this and Soul Link.
In addition, I think that malediction could also be used to improve Curse of Tongues and Exhaustion by, say, 3/6/9% to improve their effectiveness in PvP as well.
That would provide a blanket of extra HP regen through better siphon life scaling, and more effective debuffs all around, which is what affliction is all about.
I think that with the proper pet resilience scaling (which is needed no matter what), this could probably put affliction back on the map for viable specs in any format.
I have a couple ideas to sort of ease the reliance on soul link for group play for affliction, but I've given up hope on the destro side.
For affliction, I'm still convinced that moving soul siphon down to deep affliction would be the best way to go, but improving it more than it currently is. It's a pretty potent talent, but I think adding soul siphon to benefit siphon life the same way it does drain life would be a fantastic start, especially on a build that also contains Contagion. You could also possibly put mana drain scaling back into this talent as well if it's that deep, and deep enough so that even level 80 builds can't have both this and Soul Link.
In addition, I think that malediction could also be used to improve Curse of Tongues and Exhaustion by, say, 3/6/9% to improve their effectiveness in PvP as well.
That would provide a blanket of extra HP regen through better siphon life scaling, and more effective debuffs all around, which is what affliction is all about.
I think that with the proper pet resilience scaling (which is needed no matter what), this could probably put affliction back on the map for viable specs in any format.
Friday, January 4, 2008
Hunter Arena Performance thus far.
Looking at our battlegroup alone,
I'm watching closely as to how many warlocks vs hunters there are in top-rated 5s teams that SK-Gaming website is picking up.
I'm not sure why I'm not showing up on the 5s list, as our 5s team is rated pretty high @ 1919 currently. That would put me in 9th place on SK gamings website for hunters in 5s for BG9. That isn't too shabby, considering my gear really isn't all that great yet as about half of it is from kara/heroics, and I'm at about 276 resil, 10800 hp, and only 6400 armor with a crappy bow.
Keep in mind that I hit 70 on Dec1, 07, and I've been on break since my gf is here visiting me for winter break, so I haven't had much time to improve my gear that much.
It does seem, based on this data, that warlocks are far more popular (or at least common) of an arena class than hunters. Does this mean that most hunters don't like PVP? I really can't answer that, but from what I've experienced so far, this does not mean that hunters are not arena viable. Even with 3 of us on the team being undergeared, we went 2-3 against Neilyo's SK gaming 5s team who are in full s2/s3 gear with mostly s3 weapons.
I'm fairly satisfied with my pvp/arena performance, aside from a few gripes about minor things such as pet mechanics and how expensive it is to play one. I still, however, feel weak against magic-heavy burn teams. I really have no escape options vs this. I often become conflicted, because often the best way to disrupt magic dps is to LOS it as best as you can, however, doing so severely limits my own physical dps, thus limiting the knockback I could be causing which would slow the offending magic DPS. I don't have clos/vanish/etc, and I don't have intervene/defensive/spell reflect. I really have to just either stand there and eat the incoming magic dps while I try to plink away slowing one attacker (usually a spriest or ele shaman), or just LoS as best as I can and hope that my healers don't get CS'd while winding up a heal to keep me alive. That's really when I feel the weakest out of any matchup, which is odd, since I felt hunters are good counters to casters. (And they usually are)
I don't really mind getting rocked by warriors that I can't get away from. If I played a warrior, I wouldn't want to get kited all damn day either. I think our ability to deal with melee (and especially rogues) is pretty good.
The ONLY thing I think we need improvement on in this area is a ranged "peel" to get a melee off of not necessarily me, but my teammates. Other than scatter shot, I don't really have any way of doing this, and even that isn't reliable in a lot of situations. I would kill for a frost arrow that would deploy a frost trap from range, but I don't think it would be enough to warrant giving up silencing or scatter shot.
Other than that, I feel the class is very solid. I really like the (hunter/druid) duo's ability to counter warrior/druid in 2s as well, which is a very popular setup. Also, I've found that as a hunter/lock/druid setup in 3s, we can easily snore our way to victory against RMP. We took down happyminty's team with relative ease.
I'm watching closely as to how many warlocks vs hunters there are in top-rated 5s teams that SK-Gaming website is picking up.
I'm not sure why I'm not showing up on the 5s list, as our 5s team is rated pretty high @ 1919 currently. That would put me in 9th place on SK gamings website for hunters in 5s for BG9. That isn't too shabby, considering my gear really isn't all that great yet as about half of it is from kara/heroics, and I'm at about 276 resil, 10800 hp, and only 6400 armor with a crappy bow.
Keep in mind that I hit 70 on Dec1, 07, and I've been on break since my gf is here visiting me for winter break, so I haven't had much time to improve my gear that much.
It does seem, based on this data, that warlocks are far more popular (or at least common) of an arena class than hunters. Does this mean that most hunters don't like PVP? I really can't answer that, but from what I've experienced so far, this does not mean that hunters are not arena viable. Even with 3 of us on the team being undergeared, we went 2-3 against Neilyo's SK gaming 5s team who are in full s2/s3 gear with mostly s3 weapons.
I'm fairly satisfied with my pvp/arena performance, aside from a few gripes about minor things such as pet mechanics and how expensive it is to play one. I still, however, feel weak against magic-heavy burn teams. I really have no escape options vs this. I often become conflicted, because often the best way to disrupt magic dps is to LOS it as best as you can, however, doing so severely limits my own physical dps, thus limiting the knockback I could be causing which would slow the offending magic DPS. I don't have clos/vanish/etc, and I don't have intervene/defensive/spell reflect. I really have to just either stand there and eat the incoming magic dps while I try to plink away slowing one attacker (usually a spriest or ele shaman), or just LoS as best as I can and hope that my healers don't get CS'd while winding up a heal to keep me alive. That's really when I feel the weakest out of any matchup, which is odd, since I felt hunters are good counters to casters. (And they usually are)
I don't really mind getting rocked by warriors that I can't get away from. If I played a warrior, I wouldn't want to get kited all damn day either. I think our ability to deal with melee (and especially rogues) is pretty good.
The ONLY thing I think we need improvement on in this area is a ranged "peel" to get a melee off of not necessarily me, but my teammates. Other than scatter shot, I don't really have any way of doing this, and even that isn't reliable in a lot of situations. I would kill for a frost arrow that would deploy a frost trap from range, but I don't think it would be enough to warrant giving up silencing or scatter shot.
Other than that, I feel the class is very solid. I really like the (hunter/druid) duo's ability to counter warrior/druid in 2s as well, which is a very popular setup. Also, I've found that as a hunter/lock/druid setup in 3s, we can easily snore our way to victory against RMP. We took down happyminty's team with relative ease.
Wednesday, December 26, 2007
Merry Christmas!
I hope everyone had a good christmas (or whatever holiday you observe).
My wonderful girlfriend gets to stay with me for winters break between her grueling semesters at college. She is taking the architecture program at Cornell University. And she got me a Wii! She's the best! :)
Oh, and if you haven't seen the new movie "I Am Legend" yet, don't bother. It was pretty horrible.
My wonderful girlfriend gets to stay with me for winters break between her grueling semesters at college. She is taking the architecture program at Cornell University. And she got me a Wii! She's the best! :)
Oh, and if you haven't seen the new movie "I Am Legend" yet, don't bother. It was pretty horrible.
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